although they be confcious of their own inability to furnifh one fingle fhip for the fupport of the Catalans, are at this inftant fpurring them on to their ruin by promises of aid and protection!

Thus much in anfwer to Mr Steele's account of the affairs of Europe; from which he deduceth the univerfal monarchy of France, and the danger of I know not how many Popish fucceffors to Britain. His political reflections are as good as his facts. We must obferve, fays he, that the perfon who seems to be the most favoured by the French King in the late treaties, is the Duke of Savoy. Extremely right; for whatever that prince got by the peace, he owes entirely to her Majefty, as a juft reward for his having been so firm and useful an ally; neither was France brought with more difficulty to yield any one point than that of allowing the Duke fuch a barrier as the QUEEN insisted on.

He is become the most powerful prince in Italy. I had rather fee him fo than the Emperor. He is fupp fed to have entered into a fecret and strict alliance with the haufe of Bourbon. This is one of those facts wherein I am most inclined to believe the author, because it is what he must needs be utterly ignorant of, and therefore may poffibly be true.

I thought indeed we fhould be fafe from all Popifh fucceffors as far as Italy, because of the prodigious clutter about fending the pretender thither. But they will never agree where to fix their longitude. The Duke of Savoy is the more dangerous for removing to Sicily: he. adds to our fears for being too near. So whether France conquer Germany, or be in peace and good understanding with it, either event will put us and Holland at the mercy of France, which hath a quiver full of pretenders at its back, whenever the Chevalier shall die.

This was juft the logic of poor Prince Butler, a splenetic madman, whom every body may remember about the town. Prince Pamphilio in Italy employed emillaries to torment Prince Butler here. But what if Prince Painphilio die? Why then he had left in his will, that his heirs and executors torment Prince Butler for ever.

I cannot think it a misfortune what Mr Steele affirms, that treasonable books lately difperfed among us flriking

apparently

apparently at the Hanover fucceffion, have passed almost without obfervation from the generality of the people; because it seems a certain fign, that the generality of the people are well difpofed to that illuftrious family: but I look upon it as a great evil, to fee feditious books dif perfed among us, apparently striking at the Queen and her administration, at the conftitution of church and ftate, and at all religion; yet paffing without obferva tion from the generality of thofe in power but whether this remiffhefs may be imputed to Whitehall, or Westminster-hall, is other mens bufinefs to inquire. Mr Steele knows in his confcience, that the queries concerning the pretender iffued from one of his own party. And as for the poor nonjuring clergyman, who was trufted with committing to the prefs a late book on the fubject of hereditary right, by a strain of the fummum jus he is now, as I am told, with half a score children, ftarving and rotting among thieves and pick-pockets in the common room of a stinking jail. I have never feen either the book or the publisher; however, I would fain ask one fingle perfont in the world a queftion; why he hath so often drank the abdicated King's health upon his knees?

-But the transition is natural and frequent, and I fhall not trouble him for an answer.

It is the hardest cafe in the world, that Mr Steele fhould take up the artificial reports of his own faction, and then put them off upon the world as additional fears of a Popifh fucceffor. I can affure him, that no good fubject of the QUEEN is under the least concern, whether the pretender be converted or no, farther than their wishes that all men would embrace the true religion. But reporting backwards and forwards upon this point, helps to keep up the noife, and is a topic for Mr Steele to enlarge himself upon, by fhewing how little we can depend on fuch converfions, by collecting a lift of Popish cruelties, and repeating after himself and the Bishop of Sarum

* Upon his conviction he was committed to the Marshalfea, and at his fentence, to the Queen's bench for three years, Hawkef.

Parker, afterward Lord Chancellor.

the

rum the difmal effects likely to follow upon the return of that fuperftition among us.

But as this writer is reported by those who know him to be what the French call journalier, his fear and courage operating according to the weather in our uncertain climate; I am apt to believe the two laft pages of his Crifis were written on a fun-fhine day. This I guess from the general tenor of them, and particularly from an unwary assertion, which, if he believes as firmly as I do, will at once overthrow all his foreign and domestic fears of a Popish fucceffor. As divided a people as we are, thofe who ftand for the house of Hanover are INFINITELY fuperior in number, wealth, courage, and all arts military and civil, to thofe in the contrary interest; besides which we have the laws, I fay, the laws, on our fide. The laws, I fay, the laws. This elegant repetition is, I think, a little out of place; for the stress might better have been laid upon fo great a majority of the nation; without which I doubt the laws would be of little weight, although they be very good additional fecurities. And if what he here afferts be true, as it certainly is, although he affert it, (for I allow even the majority of his own party to be against the pretender), there can be no danger of a Popish fucceffor, except from the unreafonable jealoufies of the best among that party, and from the malice, the avarice, or ambition of the worft; without which Britain would be able to defend her fucceffion against all her enemies both at home and abroad. Most of the dangers from abroad, which he enumerates as the confequences of this very bad peace made by the QUEEN, and approved by parliament, must have subsisted under any peace at all; unless, among other projects equally feasible, we could have ftipulated to cut the throats of every Popish relation to the royal family.

Well, by this author's own confeffion a number infi nitely fuperior, and the best circumstantiated imaginable, are for the fucceffion in the house of Hanover. This fucceffion is eftablished, confirmed, and fecured by feveral laws; her Majefty's repeated declarations, and the oaths of all her fubjects, engage both her and them to preferve what those laws have fettled. This is a fecurity indeed, a fecurity adequate at least to the importance of the thing;

and

and yet, according to the Whig fcheme, as delivered to us by Mr Steele and his coadjutors, is altogether infufficient; and the fucceffion will be defeated, the pretender brought in, and Popery established among us, without the farther affiftance of this writer and his faction.

And what fecurities have our adverfaries fubstituted in the place of these? A club of politicians, where Jenny Man prefides; 2 Crifis written by Mr Steele; a confederacy of knavifh ftockjobbers to ruin credit; a report of the QUEEN's death; an effigies of the pretender run twice through the body by a valiant Peer; a fpeech by the author of the Crifis; and, to fum up all, an unlimited freedom of reviling her Majesty and those the employs.

I have now finished the most disgustful task that ever I undertook. I could with more eafe have written three dull pamphlets, than remarked upon the falfehoods and abfurdities of one. But I was quite confounded last Wednesday, when the printer came with another pamphlet in his hand, written by the fame author, and intitled, The Englishman, being the close of the paper fo called, &c. He defired I would read it over, and confider it in a paper by itself; which laft I abfolutely refufed. Upon perusal I found it chiefly an invective against Toby, the miniftry, the Examiner, the clergy, the QUEEN, and the Poft-boy; yet at the fame time with great juftice exclaiming against thofe who prefumed to offer the leaft word against the heads of that faction whom her Majesty discarded. The author likewife propofeth an equal division of favour and employments between the Whigs and Tories; for if the former can have no part or portion in David*, they defire no longer to be his fubjects. He infifts, that her Majefty hath exactly followed Monfieur Tughe's memorialt against demolishing of Dunkirk. He reflects with great fatisfaction on the good already done to his country

* What portion have we in David?

+ " Tughe was deputed by the magiftrates of Dunkirk to "intercede with the Queen, that he would recall part of her "fentence concerning Dunkirk, by causing her thunderbolts to "fall only on the martial works and to fpare the moles and "dykes, which in their naked condition could be no more than -“objects of pity.” Hawkej.

by

Non nobis, Domine, non nobis, &c.

by the Crifis. He gives us hopes that he will leave off writing, ant confult His own quiet and happiness; and concludes with a letter to a friend at court. I fuppofe by the style of old friend, and the like, it must be fome body there of his own level; among whom his party have indeed more friends than I could wish. In this letter he afferts, that the prefent minifters were not educated in the church of England, but are new converts from Prefbytery. Upon which I can only reflect, how blind the malice of that man must be, who invents a groundless lie in order to defame his fuperiors, which would be no difgrace if it had been a truth. And he concludes with making three dermands, for the fatisfaction of himself, and other malecontents. First, the demolition of the harbour of Dunkirk. Secondly, that Great Britain and France would heartily join against the exorbitant power of the Duke of Lorrain, and force the pretender from his afylum at Bar le Duc. Laftly, that his Electoral Highness of Hanover would be fo grateful to fignify to all the world the perfect good understanding he hath with the court of England, in as plain terms as her Majefly was pleased to declare Jhe had with that houfe on her part.

As to the first of these demands, I will venture to undertake it shall be granted; but then Mr Steele and his brother malecontents must promife to believe the thing is done, after those employed have made their report; or elle bring vouchers to difprove it. Upon the fecond, I cannot tell whether her Majefty will engage in a war against the Duke of Lorrain to force him to remove the pretender; but I believe if the parliament fhould think it neceffary to addrefs upon fuch an occafion, the QUEEN will move that prince to fend him away. His last demand, offered under the title of a wish, is of fo infolent and feditious a ftrain, that I care not to touch it.. Here he directly chargeth her Majefty, with delivering a faliehood to her parliament from the throne; and declares he will not believe her, until the Elector of Hanover himfelf fhall vouch for the truth of what the hath fo folemnly affirmed..

I agree with this writer, that it is an idle thing in his antagonists

H2